Peter Spiegelman - Black Maps

At three o’clock, a maroon Chrysler pulled out of a spot just off the southwest corner of Water and Broad, and our van pulled in. We had a view of the MWB offices, to the south, and the intersection of Broad and Pearl, to the north. An attractive woman with dark eyes and olive skin and lots of curly hair was behind the wheel of the Chrysler. There was a fine-featured Hispanic man in the passenger seat. Neary spoke to them.

“Thanks for keeping it warm. What’s happening?” he asked.

“Nothing,” the woman said. “Pressman and Sanchez were on the horn ten minutes ago. Said they were all at their desks.”

“Okay. You and Victor head up Broad. Let me know your location,” Neary said. The woman nodded, and they drove off.

“Let’s do a radio check,” Neary said to Sikes. Sikes reached into a compartment on the side of the driver’s seat and took out a big radio in a black leather holster. He flicked a switch and static bloomed, then dwindled to a hiss.

“Unit One to all units, radio check,” he said.

“Unit Two to Unit One, this is Pressman, on the third. I hear you, Eddie,” said a voice.

“Three to One, Sanchez here, Sikes. I’m on four. You sound good,” said another.

“Unit Four to Unit One. DiLillo here.” It was the woman in the Chrysler. “Got a space on the west side of Broad, just south of Stone. Good view. Hear you fine. Victor’s out walking.”

“Unit Five to One. This is Victor, Eddie. It’s freaking cold out,” another voice said. Sikes looked at Neary, who nodded.

“Juan has your toy,” Neary said to me. Pritchard pulled a black, plastic case from under his seat, opened it, and took out a black plastic box a little larger than a beeper. The voice scrambler. He handed it to me.

“Checked it out this morning. It works fine. Give it a try,” he said. I spoke into it.

“Testing, testing, one, two, three. In brightest day, in blackest night, no evil shall escape my sight,” I said. I sounded like a robot castrato. I flicked it off.

“I’ll be outside the building,” Pritchard said. He fixed a tiny earpiece in his left ear and went out the back door. A minute later he was on the radio, asking for a check. Sikes acknowledged him.

Neary reached back and handed me a sheet of paper. “Here’s your cheat sheet,” he said. On the page were the names, office numbers, and home addresses of each of our suspects, along with physical descriptions of each of them, and grainy headshots that looked like they were copied off ID photos. It also listed the cell numbers of everyone on our little team.

“Who first?” I asked. I thought I knew the answer. Neary’s management wanted more than anything to know about the two Brill people on the list, and Neary wanted to know about Cheryl Compton.

“Compton,” Neary said. Sikes picked up the radio.

“Unit One to Unit Two. Give me a location on Compton, Lenny,” Sikes said. A couple of moments later a voice came back.

“Two to One. Give me a minute, Eddie,” the voice said. There was silence for a while. “Two to One. She’s not at her desk. She’s… in the hallway. She’s turning.” There was another pause. “She’s in the can, Eddie. Been in and out of there all day. Could be she’s got her period, or the runs or something.” Sikes rolled his eyes. Neary took the radio.

“One to Two. This is Neary. Spare me the health report, Len. Where’s Vetter?”

“Two to One. Just passed him in his office, boss, working at his desk,” Pressman answered. Neary looked at Sikes and me.

“Vetter first, then.” He spoke into the radio. “Unit One to all units, we’re live now with Mitch Vetter. Acknowledge.” One by one Neary’s people called in their acknowledgments. Neary handed me a cell phone. “Caller ID’s blocked. It’s all yours,” he said. I punched in Vetter’s number and switched on the voice scrambler.

“Mitchell Vetter speaking.” I remembered the high-pitched voice and the New York accent.

“Listen to me. Unless you want to see the Nick Welch case reopened as a murder investigation, be at the corner of Broad Street and Pearl in ten minutes. Ten minutes, Vetter, or you’ll be answering a lot of questions about Nick Welch.” There was a long silence at the other end of the line. And then there was laughter.

“Sid? Fucking Sid, is that you?” Vetter was laughing hard. “Jesus, you are a sick puppy. The voice thing is a cute touch, though. But who the hell is Nick Whosis? Sid? Sid?” I hung up. Neary looked at me. I shook my head.

“He thought it was funny,” I said. “Unless he is very slick, he didn’t know who Nick Welch was. He thought I was somebody named Sid.”

“Unit One to Unit Two. What’s up, Lenny?” Neary said into the radio. Lenny’s whispered voice came back quickly.

“Two here. He’s at his desk, laughing and making a phone call. Now he’s talking, still laughing. He’s stopped laughing now, looks confused. Still talking, shaking his head. Now he’s off the phone.” Pressman paused for a moment. “He’s just looking at the wall now, shaking his head. Now he’s typing at his keyboard again.”

“What do you think?” Neary asked me.

“I think he’s not our guy, but give him a few minutes,” I said. Neary nodded and called Pressman on the radio.

“One to Two. Lenny, stay close to Vetter for another fifteen.” Pressman acknowledged. Neary handed the radio back to Sikes, who updated the other units. Then we waited. After about a day, fifteen minutes passed, during which time the most exciting thing Mr. Vetter did was to buy a soda. We agreed to move on. Neary looked at Sikes.

“Unit One to Unit Two. Where’s Compton at, Lenny?” Sikes said. It took a couple of minutes for the answer to come back.

“Two here. She’s at her desk, nobody else in the room.” Neary nodded. Sikes got on the radio again and told all of Neary’s people we were placing the call to Compton. They acknowledged, and Neary looked at me. I flicked on the voice box and punched her number.

“Cheryl Compton.” She spoke quickly. I said my piece, and again there was a long silence, longer this time than with Vetter. But when Cheryl answered, it wasn’t with laughter.

“Who is this?” she said in a low, tense voice.

“Ten minutes, Cheryl,” I said. More silence.

“What the hell are you doing to me?” she hissed. I hung up. Neary looked at me.

“She wasn’t laughing,” I said. Sikes called Pressman.

“Talk to me, Lenny.”

“She’s just sitting there, holding on to the arms of her chair, looking at the walls. She looks… I don’t know, real stiff.” There was a pause. “Now she’s picking up the phone. She’s talking, now she’s hanging up. Looks like maybe she left a message for somebody. Okay, she’s getting up now. I’m moving.” There was another pause, longer this time, then Pressman came back. “She’s walking around the main corridor, to the north end of the building. She’s going down one of the aisles. She’s at a window, looking out. I got to keep moving, sorry.”

We waited for Pressman to come back. Neary was pale and rigid with tension, and maybe anger. He looked exhausted. Sikes looked bored. Then Pressman spoke.

“Okay, she’s back in her office now. She’s on the phone again.. talking… hanging up. Looks like another message. She’s just sitting there again.” Neary looked at me.

“I don’t know, Tom,” I said. “Give her some time.” He looked at his watch. It was three-forty and getting dark out. It was also getting closer to rush hour, which mostly worked against us. The bigger crowds made it harder to spot a tail, but they also made it much easier to lose your subject.

“Twenty minutes,” he said. Sikes spread the word. We waited. Pressman gave us reports every five minutes. He told us about Cheryl Compton sitting, staring at the walls, calling numbers that seemed not to answer, pacing around her desk, sitting back down, and staring some more. Twenty minutes came and went, and Neary gave it fifteen more. Five minutes before that deadline, Compton seemed to settle down and go back to work.